


scars beneath scars (beneath scars)

by coalitiongirl_ficlets (coalitiongirl)



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-07
Updated: 2015-07-07
Packaged: 2018-04-08 02:14:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4286898
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coalitiongirl/pseuds/coalitiongirl_ficlets
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Oh,” their social worker says, and it’s sheepish and guilty like she knows she’s about to violate Regina’s one firm condition. “She. She’s a girl.”</p><p>Regina’s fingers freeze in Emma’s hair. “No,” she says.</p>
            </blockquote>





	scars beneath scars (beneath scars)

**Author's Note:**

> The prompt was "Established SQ, Emma kisses the scar on Regina's lip. You choose the context!" 
> 
> I chose pain. :)

They get the news at dinnertime. Henry is out studying for his APs with a friend and Neal is over so he and Emma can subtly push peas from his plate to hers and back again, and Regina almost doesn’t pick up the phone. But she sees that the caller ID is social services and she nearly jumps from her seat, Emma scrambling after her.

They move to the study and put the phone on speaker, listening to the tinny voice on the other end.  _I know it’s not what you signed up for— much older— unsustainable home life—_  The explaining pour out from the other end and Regina can see Emma’s lips firming as they pile up, shadows of another _not what you signed up for_  child drawing determination on her face.

“Of course we’ll take him,” Regina says, and Emma exhales in a voiceless sob, sinking to the ground. Regina guides Emma’s head onto her lap, winding reassuring fingers through her hair. “For as long as he needs a home.”

“Oh,” their social worker says, and it’s sheepish and guilty like she knows she’s about to violate Regina’s one firm condition. “She. She’s a girl.”

Regina’s fingers freeze in Emma’s hair. “No,” she says. Emma jerks away from her as though she’s been burned and Regina rises and stalks from the room, their social worker stammering behind them.  
  
She’d been adamant from the start, from the moment they’d decided to expand their family.  _Boys. Only boys_. Henry had been convinced that it had been about giving him another boy to even the scales and Emma had never asked why. Emma had looked at her with eyes that  _know_  and had asked nothing at all.

She storms out of the house, breathing raggedly as she rests her head against the trunk of her apple tree and tries not to weep with frustration. She  _can’t, she can’t, she can’t can’t can’t_ –

She reaches up blindly to touch the one physical marker of her childhood, a single cut that had left a scar on her lip. Her scars aren’t visible, just as Emma’s skin is smooth and unmarred, just as you can pull out a heart and squeeze it and no one would ever know after. They bear their wounds in hoarse tears and hands that grip too hard and in raw eyes-kisses-understanding. And today she…

“I told her you’d call her back,” Emma says, her voice hollow and small in the silence of the yard.

“I can’t,” Regina whispers, and her chin is caught in Emma Swan’s hands and raised away from the tree. “I’m sorry. I know you need—”

“I do need,” Emma’s eyes hurt like  _you would do that/my gift to you is good memories_ /standing in the woods with anguished hope across her face. “She needs. So I need.”

Regina shakes her head, without words. Emma’s hands tremble around her chin and her words tremble around the things they don’t say. “Regina,” she breathes.

“I  _can’t_ ,” Regina says again.

“You are not your mother,” Emma murmurs, and Regina flinches. “You had your heart torn from your chest and you still loved. You always loved.” The words stick in Emma’s throat and Regina can only guess what they are, like she could only guess the day Emma had cried over a paper with messy crayon scrawls that Regina had saved for a decade. “You are not your mother,” Emma says again, more forcefully.

“I don’t know that,” Regina croaks. “I’ve never—” She’s mothered one girl and despised her for it, and she doesn’t know what ugly demons would come out to play if she tries to love instead.  _Daughters_ , reckless and stubborn and waiting to be molded, Mother’s perfect little lady who would someday be queen. Girls with the world at their fingertips if you  _only try, Regina, you can have greatness in your grasp_. Girls scarred and smooth-skinned and Regina is petrified in Emma’s grasp.

“ _Please, please_ ,” Emma is whispering, and Regina tears her eyes from the past and finds Emma’s instead. Emma who is only a girl sometimes, rejected and alone and forgotten. Emma who craves love so hard that Regina’s never known how to keep from gifting it to her. Emma who’d never belonged until she’d come to Storybrooke.

“For you,” Emma says. “Not because I need. We all need, don’t you see?” She’s crying now (They’re both crying, blotchy-faced and shivering in the cold, and Regina aches with love and fear and fear) and she leans over, pressing her lips to Regina’s scar. “Please, Regina.”

Her lips remain there, just above Regina’s mouth, the tip of her tongue gliding out to trace the scar, and she tastes like saltwater and love and hope. Regina kisses her back, finds scars they can’t see and loses herself within them.

Emma kisses her and finds her and brings her home, neither one of them alone anymore.

“Yes,” Regina says. “Okay.”


End file.
